SW wants to meet ds alone?

[namechangesforthehardstuff]

Well that's it really. I think she wants to ask her about adoption. But ds is 3 and another SW already told us they'd just want to meet her, with us, for a general chat.

I'm quite uncomfortable with a stranger talking to her about this - and quite uncomfortable about her being told at all. It feels way too early, we're not even at stage 2. We haven't talked to dd about adoption and we aren't planning to until it's real

Feedback? Advice?

She's my,dd - why is auto correct doing that?

My dd was 3 when we were doing home visits, and yes the SW had to talk to her alone. I think it's seen as a necessary part of the process - they have a duty of care to children already in the family, and have to talk to them directly and without parental influence/interference.

We did put this off as late in the process as possible - the SW asked if we were worried about it and I said no, but I thought the later she left it the more sense she would get out of a child who is after all only 3.

In the event we were in the room, but sat on the other side of it and didn't interfere. It was quite quick - ten minutes? - I think dd drew her a picture and then they had a chat. I joined them for the last part of it, when sw was asking dd what she liked. dd gave her a long list - volcanoes, dinosaurs, etc - then at the end said, "And I like my front bottom! Look! [pulling up skirt] And I like touching it LIKE THIS!"

SW turned to me and said, "We'll leave that out of the report, shall we?"

More seriously, when were you planning to tell your dd? When you say 'real', do you mean after approval? After matching? I think it does have to be raised before approval, because sw has to assess your child as part of the process. But I agree there's no point making a bit deal of it at this stage. dd waited a whole year between that assessment and actually getting her baby sister, and we had to manage her impatience.

Just to add that you shoudl of course talk to your dd about this BEFORE the sw does.

I have started having vague kind of 'some people get their babies when they are very tiny but some babies are a little bit older when they come to be your sister/brother' kind of conversations. And 'new sisters brothers can need lots of attention' kind of conversations.

Just not sure what discussing this is going to achieve.

I can see how meeting her, maybe seeing how she is with younger children is relevant. But she thinks a dinosaur would make a great pet so I can't really see where her discernment is going to be useful...

I suppose I'm really worried that we won't be accepted and then she'll expect a sister or brother who will never come I don't want that for me, let alone her.

And I suppose I also think that in interviews (which this sort of is) you should only undertake tasks which you're going to use to make a decision. And what could she possibly say either way which would be in any way decisive? (Which is different to how she could, in and of herself, say a lot about our parenting.)

SW is talking about being alone with her btw, not me in the room...

mmmh watching with interest, our DS is three as well. As we are considering Concurrency we will probably be introducing the topic in terms of fostering rather than adoption, so I would really want SW to be on board with that if they were to (attempt to) speak to him alone.

namechangesforthehardstuff hi, my dear it is obvious you are rather worried about this and I think you probably don't need to be.

Here is my perspective, ignore it is you like. My dd was 2 when we stated looking into this process so for several years (she is now 9) we kind of drip fed things in about adoption. By the time she was 7 we knew that we were definitely not going to have another birth child and adoption would be our only option. By 8 she was 'interviewed'. Now I know 8 is a lot older than 3 but as our daughter has dyslexia she is really quite young for her age and would have been more like a 5 or 6 year old in terms of some of her activities and understanding, (older in terms of others) at that stage. She is catching up now but for quiet a while was quite young for her age.

We made sure she always knew adoption was something we wanted to do as a family but the decision was dependant on us being accepted and a suitable child being found, neither of which were within our control. Choose your own language but I don't think it is a bad thing for any child to know that something, moving to a specific house, good grades at school or a birth brother or sister is, like a child joining your family by adoption, are not necessarily things we can guarantee. Does that make sense? We talked about wanting it to happen; hoping it would but that we were happy as a family of three, we were a complete unit and if it was not meant to be then it would also be fine.

Secondly, by the time our social worker met our daughter specifically she had already met her with us in passing on about 5 occasions. I made DD say hi etc and I think it helped for her to know who social worker was before she actually met her 'alone'.

When DD met her 'alone' she arrived with potted plants for the garden as as gift for DD, colouring sheets and coloured pencils. She sat n the dining room with DD up the table and drew pictures and talked in the most general terms about adoption and then about what kind of child DD would imagine joining the family. While I stayed in our living room, with the adjoining door partially open and sat at my computer (straining to hear what was said!).

It was all fine and at the end I joined DD and SW and then DD said loudly whispering in my ear 'Can we stop talking now?' before she was off to watch TV in the living room. It was totally fine and not a problem at all.

Finally, I would say although you are worried, your DD will probably take her cue from you so try not to pass on your worry. I would be very surprised if you application to adopt will be dependent on your DD at all but it is a process they need to go through and if you come across as very anxious about this isn't there a chance it could be misinterpreted as worry about what your DD will say. I don't mean that in a nasty sense just a worry that she may say she does not want you to adopt?

I have no reason to believe that the social worker thinking this would be the case but I am just saying if you come across as very worried it may look 'bad'.

Hopefully, it will be what it was for us, a very simple and short chat rather than an over the top interview. If you are concerned I would just couch it in the language of not wanting to let your DD get her hopes up etc and ask the social worker if you can find out the kind of things she will be asked just so you will know if DD later says anything about it you will know what she is talking about. I think that sounds reasonable.

Devora good Lord Missey that is very funny and I think you probably have got the best social worker quote I have ever heard!

How much do you like and trust your sw, nameschanges? Because that is critical here. I think you need to talk to her, and find out what she intends to say to your dd.

I would raise it in a way that is questioning and not critical, seeking information and asking about her experience in having similar discussions with other young children. Share with her your concerns, and ask her advice. (They love it if you ask their advice.) Give her a chance to put your mind at rest. Once she understands your concerns, she may offer to do it with you present?

Well I think that's part of the problem as I really know very little about her. I think we'll get to know her as we go through and then maybe I'll feel better about it.

My absolute priority in all of this until we are matched has to be the family I already have. I wasn't really expecting this to conflict with that in this way quite so early on. I was going to have a proper talk with her once we're approved as until then they could potentially drop us at any moment.

And Italian thanks for your experience. I wouldn't think it odd if she were 8 or even 6. She's just so tiny, she'll think a baby is coming tomorrow

namechanges, I know exactly how you feel. I was talking to DS recently, as I do sometimes, in general terms, like, we've been trying to gently get the concept across that some babies can't be looked after by their mummy and daddy, and then someone else needs to look after them. In some ways I hate him having to 'know' this already, I'd like him to remain a worry-free child for a loooong time yet. And I worry that he might start worrying that HE for some reason can't stay with his parents. So it is important to me to do this gently and in a positive, non-threatening way.
DS is quite interested in the idea of him, (with our help ;) ) looking after such a baby and will go on and on about feeding the baby milk, and which books would be good to read to baby, and where would baby sleep, and would we take baby to the park in a pushchair, and would baby be sad about not being with his/her mummy and daddy, and what could we do to cheer baby up … then next question, 'when is the baby coming? Tomorrow?' …
I think at this age, there is just no way of thinking about things hypothetically. I think our strategy will be to talk about it in terms of 'sometime in the future, we don't know when, it might be a very long time yet' instead.

I think in general, if you have consciously decided in which terms you want to talk to your child about the issue, and in which terms NOT, then I'd hope your SW will be willing to take this into consideration.

For instance, as we are considering concurrency, with the chance that any baby placed with us might eventually return to BM, we are NOT talking to DS about having a new 'brother or sister'. Normally young children have no say in the question wether they are to have a/nother sibling anyway, so that is not something we feel we need to prepare him for so that he can form an opinion and answer questions. I very much hope that we can convince our SW to talk to him in terms of 'looking after a baby who can't stay with its mummy and daddy'.

Thanks Meita that's helpful.

This struck me: I think in general, if you have consciously decided in which terms you want to talk to your child about the issue, and in which terms NOT, then I'd hope your SW will be willing to take this into consideration.

It has to be up to us doesn't it? And if we're being reasonable about it and explaining why and not being defensive then surely that can't be a deal breaker?

namechangesforthehardstuff your daughter will trust you, so if you explain to her in your terms how you want to explain it than whatever the social worker says in her time with your daughter I think your daughter will see it the way you represent it.

I say this because I feel you are worried that the social worker will really upset your dd or something. I really hope she will not. Things have changed in that we were not allowed to apply to adopt until our DD was five and a half (and we did not start the process until she was 7) so it is different with your DD only being 3.

I would share your concerns with your SW as Devora says ... would raise it in a way that is questioning and not critical...

Adoption does seem to involve a degree of losing control of some things a bit and I am sure we have all felt anxious about bits of it. My heart goes out to you but I do feel it will be OK.

Good luck.

(PS I grew to really like our social worker and cried when she handed over to the next person but I was not so keen at first and it did take time to grow comfortable with her.)

Yes I suppose I know that dd is not her priority and I am not used to letting anyone for whom dd is not the first priority have any say over anything to do with her. Which might be a bit pfb but I don't care - she is bloody precious

And I don't want her upset or to get her hopes up or to think she's said something wrong maybe and that's why we're not getting a baby. You know what kids are like - they can make up all kinds of stuff.

namechange, you say ''dd is not her priority' in a way that suggests you think this act is hostile to your dd's interests. But the reason the sw has to do this is because she has a duty of care to your dd too, and the idea is that she should have a sense of your dd's wants and needs and it's hard for her to honestly say she thinks this is a good idea for your dd if she's never actually talked to her.

Now, I accept that the unknown here is HOW she will talk to your dd and the quality of that interaction may be positive or negative. But I would question your assumption that it must be risky and negative. Might it not turn out that actually she has a very good understanding of how to talk with 3 yos in this kind of situation?

I was very happy with how my sw talked to my dd. She was very fond of my dd and advocated for her quite strongly at times e.g. when fc was being hostile to her, and everyone else was focused on my adopted child, it was the sw who spoke up and said this is unacceptable for dd1 to be treated like this.

Talk to her! You may find she can completely put your mind at rest about how she will handle the encounter.

I know that's what I need to do. Am seeing her next week to discuss. Just ranting and raving here 'cos I can

namechange our social worker was very sure our DD was very important in the whole process, she took our DD very seriously, she knew we did. I really hope your social worker will too.

PS of course you can rant and rave here! We are all here for that! I feel sure Devora is right. It is in no one's interests (yours, your DD, the new child or anyone else) that an adoption should go ahead and then face problems for lack of care and your sw must view all of you as a family unit as you are and make sure it all work smoothly. Our children are so precious to us but we do at different stages put them in the care of others for whom they are not so precious! Nursery school, teachers etc. What I think many of us require of them is not that our child is as important to them as they are to us but rather that they do their job safely and well, and you have every right to work out from your social worker whether she will deal with this in a way you approve of. Good luck.

Yes that's a good way of putting it Italian. Have got myself a bit wound up, need to chill before I see her...